Ran Skyhawk Alternatives

[Zen]

It would all depend on the specifics of a navalised F5, which is to my knowledge a very efficiently compact machine.

Hmmm.....

24,000lb is close to the upper limit of the F5E and the F5F.

ROA for a F5A is 186nm hi-lo-hi, max weapon load with allowences.

BTW the ex-dutch Majestic type was strengthened for 30,000lb aircraft.

[Lawman]

To be honest, the Skyhawk is still almost certainly the best bet - good range, good capability, and very agile. It could be fitted with a good radar, and be wired for four sidewinders - the only question is whether it could be fitted for longer range Sparrows! A Skyhawk with a drop tank on the centreline, and a pair of Sparrows inboard and a pair of Sidewinders outboard would be excellent.

On the subject of carriers, I don't really see a much larger carrier being bought - there wouldn't really be the aircraft available to the RAN to make it worthwhile. A Centaur would be the upper end, allowing up to twenty Skyhawks if that were desired, but any more than that would be too expensive. One option might be a joint RN/RAN Pacific Fleet, with Centaur and Hermes (Centaur modernised to the Hermes spec), being operated by combined RN/RAN crews. They would operate joint RN/RAN Fleet Air Arm airwings, with Aussie Skyhawks and British owned Crusaders. The carriers would be based in Australia, as part of the British continuing presence 'East of Suez', along with full equipment for an entire British Infantry Division, prepositioned for rapid reinforcement.  

[Zen]

I'd rather stick with the HSA P146, and view it as the Skyhawk, Scimitar and F8 successor.

Got myself a scanner for christmass, so here we a go, a little knock up!

[Archibald]

I'd rather stick with the HSA P146, and view it as the Skyhawk, Scimitar and F8 successor.

Got myself a scanner for christmass, so here we a go, a little knock up!

Man, that look superb! I've build a P-146 from a Jaguar many moons ago. Love this machine!  

[BadersBusCompany]

I'd rather stick with the HSA P146, and view it as the Skyhawk, Scimitar and F8 successor.

Got myself a scanner for christmass, so here we a go, a little knock up!

I recognise this image
Is it one of your own Zen?

regards

BBC

[Zen]

did you do this?



Because I took a scan of the P141 and used the colour, roundall, tail art and lettering from it.

[GTX]

That is one of John's (aka Maverick) creations.

Regards,

Greg

[GTX]

Here's another possible - what about a navalised Aeritalia G.91 or better yet a navalised G.91Y?



Regards,

Greg

[B777LR]

How about a navalised Draken? Would it be too fard to land a delta wing on a carrier?

[Nick]

I keep thinking of a navalised Gnat to go with the Gnats they should have had for local air defence.

[GTX]

How about a navalised Draken? Would it be too fard to land a delta wing on a carrier?

I think a Draken would be too large.

Regards,

Greg

[Archibald]

And not easy to land. G.91 and Gnats, how interesting! Well one can add lots of LWF fighters of the 60's, such as the HF-24 (love this one!) Ha-300, etc.  

[fallenphoenix]

hmmm never thought about the Draken, wasnt realy that big also it wouldnt have been the first naval delta... the F4D Skyray was a delta and technically so was the A-4.
Was thinking about the 177 again the other night and remembered something about the rocket fuels, the catalyst wasnt in liquid form as in the Me-163. The plan was to use a coating of (forgotten what exactly) in the rocket nozzle that would ignite on contact with the liquid fuel.

[Zen]

Silver mesh probably.

Did I mention endurance on jet fuel (removing rocket fuel tankage and replacing it with jet fuel tanks) is 2 hours and 200nm ROA (radius, range is at least twice that).

[Archibald]

Hmmm....weight limit is 24,000lb for Melbourne if memory serves

I know it has been mentioned at the beginning of the thread.

I've checked Grumman Tiger and Super Tiger weights from Joe Baugher website.  

F11F Tiger
14500 Ibs empty
21300 Ibs loaded
24000 Ibs MTOW

Super Tiger
16500 Ibs empty
23700 Ibs loaded
26000 Ibs MTOW

So we can exclude the latter, but the F-11F sounds interesting. Never realised before how similar were the Etendard IV and F11F, how interesting...